Robert H. Ellsworth

Robert Hatfield Ellsworth (July 13, 1929 – August 3, 2014) was a Manhattan-based American art dealer of Asian paintings and furniture from the Ming dynasty. His art collection can be found in museums in the United States. He was a supporter of architectural restoration in Huangshan, China and is an honorary Chinese citizen.

Robert H. Ellsworth
Born
Robert Hatfield Ellsworth

(1929-07-13)July 13, 1929
New York, New York
DiedAugust 3, 2014(2014-08-03) (aged 85)
New York, New York
OccupationArt dealer
RelativesOliver Ellsworth

Early life

Robert H. Ellsworth was born on July 13, 1929 in Manhattan, New York City.[1] His father, Presley Elmer Ellsworth (1894-1957) was a dentist and his mother, LaFerne Hatfield Ellsworth (1900-1976) an opera singer.[1][2][3][4][5] On his paternal side, he was a descendant of Oliver Ellsworth.[1] His parents divorced when he was four years old.[2] Ellsworth had a difficult relationship with his father, whom he described as the dentist who invented root canal treatment[6][7] and perfected the porcelain capping of teeth,[2] and who also married six times.[6]

Career

Ellsworth traced the commencement of his trading experience to the age of fourteen, when he assisted his mother raise funds for China War Relief by trading gifts she had received, such as snuff bottles. He commenced buying and reselling such items, pocketing the difference.[6] Ellsworth, who did not complete high school, became licensed as a trader in antiques at the age of nineteen, having commenced working at the age of seventeen[6] in an antiques store in Manhattan, where he was mentored by Alice Boney (1901-1988), a prominent dealer in art from China and Japan.[1][8] He opened his own shop in 1959, at the age of 30.[6] In 1970, he moved his business and residence to a Manhattan townhouse, which he shared with actress Claudette Colbert until 1977, when he moved his business and residence to an apartment at 960 Fifth Avenue. He remained at 960 Fifth Avenue for the balance of his career.[6]

Ellsworth was an art dealer of Ming dynasty furniture and modern Chinese paintings.[1] One of his clients was John D. Rockefeller III, who donated his collection to the Asia Society posthumously.[1] Other clients included Sir Joseph Hotung, Herbert Irving, the co-founder of Sysco[2] and socialite Brooke Astor, after whom a room at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is named.[6]

He published Chinese Furniture: Hardwood Examples of the Ming and Early Ch'ing Dynasty in 1970; it was reprinted in 1997.[9] He also published Later Chinese Painting and Calligraphy: 1800-1950, a three-volume art book, in 1987.[1][2]

He purchased Christian Humann's art collection for US$12 million 1981.[1] It included 1,600 paintings and objets d'art.[1] He later sold 15 paintings to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and 15 more to the Cleveland Museum of Art as well as some more to the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.[1] Some of the furniture he sold to the Met can see at the Astor Court.[1] He also donated 500 paintings to the Met in 1986.[1]

Sotheby's auctioned 113 of his paintings in 1993.[2] Two decades later, in 2012, Christie's auctioned 70 of his Chinese bronze mirrors.[1]

Philanthropy

In 1993,[10] Ellsworth founded the Hong-Kong based Chinese Heritage Art Foundation, a non-profit organization whose aim is to restore Ming and Qing dynasty-era architecture in Huizhou District of Huangshan, Anhui Province, China.[1][2][6] He was named an "honorary citizen of China" that same year,[2] reputedly only the fourth person to be so honored as of that time.[6]

Personal life

He resided in a twenty-room apartment at 960 Fifth Avenue on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.[1][2] His apartment was burglarized in 1977, and artwork worth $300,000 was stolen from him.[1] He lived for forty years with a companion, Masahiro Hashiguchi, a Japanese restaurateur with whom he co-owned Gibbon, a former restaurant on the Upper East Side.[1][2] He spent his weekends in New Fairfield, Connecticut.[2]

Death

He died on August 3, 2014, at the age of eighty-five.[1] A posthumous auction was organized by Christie's. It was attended by Chinese billionaire investor Liu Yiqian, among others.[11]

Ellsworth's companion, Hashiguchi, as executor, in 2015 sued attorney George L. Bischof, who drafted Ellsworth's will in 2010, arguing that it "fails to qualify for the federal estate tax charitable deduction."[12] Meanwhile, the will revealed that he donated US$50,000 to two waitresses at Donohue's Steak House[13] on the Upper East Side, where he dined twice a day, four days a week, for decades.[14][13]

References
  1. Robert H. Ellsworth Is Dead at 85 After a Life Devoted to Chinese Art, The New York Times, August 7, 2014
  2. Geraldine Norman, An orientalist in Manhattan: He lives in a 20-room New York apartment and is the world's richest dealer in Chinese art. But how did Robert Ellsworth get there?, The Independent, 26 June 1994
  3. Alexandra Munroe, Robert Hatfield Ellsworth (1929–2014): The Sensuous Immortal, March 10, 2015. Retrieved 2017-02-24.
  4. The 1853 birth year of Ellsworth's father in Robert Hatfield Ellsworth (1929–2014): The Sensuous Immortal would appear to be in error, since it would place Ellsworth's father at 76 and his mother at 29 at the time of Ellsworth's birth. A person seeking information on Presley Elmer Ellsworth describes his year of birth as 1894. Presley Elmer Ellsworth is described as having a background in Missouri and having served in the U.S. Dental Corps. in both World War I and World War II. The name of Ellsworth's mother is given as Lelah Fern Hatfield, as opposed to LaFerne Hatfield. See John Kent, Ancestry Message Board: Presley Elmer Ellsworth. Ancestry.com, April 4, 1999. Retrieved 2017-02-24.
  5. The singing career of LaFerne Hatfield Ellsworth is not readily evident from internet searches.
  6. Tony Walker, "Lamenting the thinning ranks of the great antique collectors". Financial Post Weekend, The Review, October 10–12, 1998, p. R3.
  7. In a history of significant contributors to the development of endodontics, Presley Elmer Ellsworth is not mentioned: see Arnaldo Castellucci, A brief history of endodontics; undated. endoexperience.com, retrieved 2017-02-27.
  8. Susan Heller Anderson, Alice Boney, Major Dealer of Art From China and Japan, Dies at 87. New York Times, December 23, 1988. Retrieved 2017-02-27.
  9. Chinese Furniture Bookstore
  10. Uncredited, The Legacy of Robert Hatfield Ellsworth; Christie's. Retrieved 2017-03-02.
  11. Georgina Adam, The Art Market: Christie’s Robert Ellsworth auction, Financial Times, March 27, 2015
  12. Rozalia Jovanovic, Robert Ellsworth Estate Sues Attorney Over $25 Million Tax Blunder on Eve of Christie's Sale, Artnet, March 18, 2015
  13. Guy Trebay, At Donohue’s, a Nightly Steak, a Life Gone By. New York Times, May 31, 2015. Retrieved 2017-03-03.
  14. Emily Saul, Art mogul dies, leaves waitresses the tip of a lifetime, The New York Post, May 11, 2015
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